Many of us have had this feeling over the past couple of years that McCarthyism has reared its ugly head into American politics once again.

Since President Obama came to office and people such as Glenn Beck et al have risen to stardom in the Tea Party wave that has swept since 2008, there has been a palatable change – a rise in divisions and us versus them.

McCarthyism for those not in the know, is named after Joe McCarthy who during the “red scare” era of the 50’s conducted trials of so-called “anti-americans”, those who by baseless accusations, fear mongering etc, Joe McCarthy wanted to label as “commies” – sound familiar? Yes that’s because if you tune into Glenn Beck or listen to people such as Sarah Palin, that is what you will hear.

And McCarthyism is not just the stalwart of tv personalities – it has it’s supporters in government today – those who would like to use fear to justify the holdings of hearings against fellow American’s simply because they are Muslims.

Now I agree that more needs to be done to understand why homegrown terrorism is occurring but doing it while singling out Americans just because of their religious conviction – doesn’t that smell like McCarthyism to you?

As CBS said in an article it ran on the 17 December, quoting Representative Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), the first Muslim member of Congress:

“We need to make sure that we stand for civil liberties, so we can deprive people like Osama bin Laden of the claim that Muslims are poorly treated in America….The United States is not at war with Islam.”

And although the National Counterterrorism Center acknowledges that there has been a rise in support of Al Qaeda, “it’s still too early to say that we have a trend” says it’s director Michael Leiter.

He continued:

“It has been only a tiny, tiny percentage of Americans — increasingly more this year, but still a tiny percentage of Muslim Americans — who have for a variety of reasons found appeal in this al Qaeda ideology,”

So why does King want hearings? Well Peter King has long been “vocal” against “radical Islam”. He was a strong voice against the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque” earlier this year and suggested in 2004 to Fox News host Sean Hannity that “no American Muslim leaders are cooperating in the war on terror”. He also suggested, without anything to back this up, that “80-85 percent of mosques in this country are controlled by Islamic fundamentalists. . . . I’ll stand by that number of 85 percent. This is an enemy living amongst us.” (WND.com)

This at a time when he was promoting a book that he called “half truth and half fiction” about future Islamic plots.

Contrary to what King may want you to believe there is no justification for this. As I have shown the National Counterterrorism Center have said there is a rise in support but not on a scale that would in anyway justify Peter King’s words.

ThinkProgress points out that recent terror attacks including the Underwear Bomber and the Times Square bomber were both thwarted by Muslims:

Not only was the Times Square bomber thwarted by a Senegalese Muslim immigrant, but the father of the underwear bomber actually alerted U.S. authorities of his son’s “extreme radical views” months prior to his failed attempt. Earlier this month, one California Muslim community actually reported an FBI terrorist plant to the FBI.

They go on to quote a NYTimes study which shows “many mosque leaders had put significant effort into countering extremism….one reason that Muslim-American terrorism has resulted in fewer than three dozen of the 136,000 murders committed in the United States since 9/11.”

As Rep. Keith Ellison has pointed out: “about a third of all foiled al-Qaida-related plots in the U.S. relied on support or information provided by members of the Muslim community.” (AmericanProgression)

And despite what Peter King may claim, many American Muslims have spoken out against the outrage of terrorism attacks – let’s not forget American Muslims died on 9/11 too – innocent Americans caught up with their fellow Americans in the heinous attack on American soil. Anyway, why should ordinary American Muslims be asked to all speak out against attacks – blame by association may work in people like Peter King’s world, but do we ask Christians to condemn all attacks done in our name? No and neither should we. Either that or should we hold committees asking every Catholic why they don’t collectively condemn the child abuse allegations in Catholic Churches!

But hey, in the case of many Republicans – throw the dirt and hope it sticks. And fear is a diamond!

While reading this story on various outlet’s I did a little research into Peter King myself having read a couple of comments alleging that King supported the IRA.

Jackpot! This is true.

Peter King was one of the most vocal American voices to support the IRA, a bloody terrorist group who killed thousands of British men, women and children during a 30 year campaign that only ended, officially in the mid 90’s.

“We must pledge ourselves to support those brave men and women who this very moment are carrying forth the struggle against British imperialism in the streets of Belfast and Derry.”

Peter King was also a supporter of Irish Northern Aid, which channelled funds to the IRA from American fundraisers and sympathizers. It was also accused of funneling weapons.

Weapons that were used to kill not just representatives of the British Government whom the IRA’s main grievance was with, but guns that were used to kill and maim innocent people.

One Judge was so incensed by King that he threw him out of a courtroom raging: “he was an obvious collaborator with the IRA.”

Although King later “disconnected” himself from support of the IRA to supporting Sinn Fein and only when the events of September 11 showed support for the IRA was no longer mildly accepted, King was still a supporter of terrorism.

So tell me isn’t this a case of pot calling the kettle black when Peter King, who will head up the House Homeland Security Committee, says he wants to investigate so-called homegrown terrorism!

By the way, hypocrisy thy name is King, this is not the first time he has rallied against one while ignoring his own past. As the Online Journal noted in 2006:

Republican Rep. Peter King (NY), the chairman of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, has called for the U.S. Attorney General to prosecute The New York Times under the Espionage Act for revealing the existence of a secret program by the Bush administration to spy on international financial transactions involving the Belgium-based Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), an international clearinghouse consortium of 7,800 banks in over 204 countries that electronically wires trillions of dollars between banks on a daily basis.

King told Chris Matthews Tuesday on MSNBC, “The New York Times is putting its own arrogant elitist left-wing agenda before the interests of the American people, and I’m calling on the attorney general to begin a criminal investigation and prosecution of the New York Times — its reporters, the editors who worked on this, and the publisher.”

As the story goes on, the journalist Wayne Madsen states: “If Mr. King wants the New York Times prosecuted for espionage, he should be prepared to be prosecuted for aiding and abetting acts of terrorism against American citizens and the citizens of America’s allies.”

And yet King would rather we forget about his past and concentrate on demonizing others – after all for a Republican it is easy to ignore their history and shout louder to tarnish others with a wide-reaching brush isn’t it?

King and the other bottom-feeders thrive on this contrived controversy. They and their group-think allies on talk radio and marionettes on FoxNews keep the dumbed-down rightwingers properly agitated so that they can play with them all year long and them lead them numbly to the polling booth in November.

Brilliant! I saw someone with a pro-IRA bumper sticker
post-911 and wanted to pound some sense into the person. Anyway, it
amazes me that people in the US forget that the most destructive
act of terrorism on American territory prior to 911 was the
Oklahoma City Bombing, which was committed by an angry white
bloke.

Brilliantly written. I have suggested the current state of McCarthyism … and (as then) many will follow the craze until it bursts by its own weight … but what about the damage it causes in the meantime.

Agreed – the big point is, that even though McCarthyism has been shown to have been nothing but fear mongering it still has its supporters – it is veen worse when you have a known terrorist sympathizer – Peter King – trying to enact hearing similar to what McCarthy did.